


Rust to Peach Means....

by orphan_account



Category: HLVRAI - Fandom
Genre: Gordon just wanted to play undertale but Benry had other ideas, He/Himrey, Other, and passing mentions of the whole loss of hand thing, i refuse to use m/m when both are some flavor of enby, not technically a continuation of the other call fic but similiar enough, once again Benry gets no relief from his pining, there is a little bit of swearing, they/them for Gordon, trans masc enby gordon
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2020-08-24
Updated: 2020-08-24
Packaged: 2021-03-06 21:01:44
Rating: Teen And Up Audiences
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 1
Words: 2,947
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/26085352
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/orphan_account/pseuds/orphan_account
Summary: Gordon isn't the only one great with an unplanned phone call. Benry just wanted to give his best buddy a hard time. What could possibly backfire besides his own pining?
Relationships: Benrey/Gordon Freeman
Comments: 5
Kudos: 95





	Rust to Peach Means....

**Author's Note:**

> Dashes are used for switches between perspective.

He couldn’t say for sure why he was calling Gordon at a time like this.

Well, that was sort of a lie. He could name a few reactions he could hope to gain from calling Gordon when he guessed they would be fast asleep. They would either answer the call in a huff and get all flustered and defensive when Benry spoke until their face turned a pleasant shade of pink, ignore the call and give Benry further proof to show they were ignoring him and hopefully enough leverage to finally properly hang out and play Heavenly sword or something, or maybe, just maybe they would happen to have trouble sleeping and ask him to come over for some comforting bro time cuddles.

Fine, the last was far fetched even in Benry’s skewed understanding of human behavior, but he was allowed to have his hopes and dreams.  
\-------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------

Gordon couldn’t say for sure why they had given Benry their “gamer tag” as he had been so hellbent on calling it. Sure, it wasn’t classified information like Benry’s PSN name. The moderately sized discord server they had set up for their little streaming career to supplement the Black Mesa hush money and keep themself from staring back into the abyss that was considering the resonance cascade almost always had an active link floating around somewhere. Benry would have found the information regardless, but accepting the friend request and engaging in the occasional conversation with the entity that had tried to kill them was something else. They had every reason to just ghost him. It would have been so simple to just put the past behind them, but there was something that kept drawing them back into the sphere of utter chaos Benry exuded. It was like a moth to a flame, but at the very least, there was less of a direct threat to letting Benry pull them in here then there was back at Black Mesa in their mind.

Benry, as if on cue, seemed quite determined to prove them wrong.

It was 4:25 AM. That was what the blurry white numbers in the corner of Gordon’s computer proclaimed. They could really careless. They had gotten wrapped up in a run of Undertale, not anything particularly tied to their usual streaming schedule. They had enough pressure to make the right choices when it came to most of the future sprawled ahead of them that they did not need a bunch of frothing young adults shaming them over their decision of whether or not to pet a dog to its maximum potential. Plus, unlike with their journey with the Science Team, they were in complete control of what mercy could be dealt. They could help everyone. It was a total power fantasy.

In truth, they could have stopped hours ago. It was not as if the game had any real time sensitive elements or a lack of save points. They had contemplated relinquishing to save the game once they had set foot in Snowdin and again at the echo flowers in Waterfall, but they just couldn’t bring themselves to close it when the section should be quick and easy. By the time they had gotten to the hotdog stand at the edge of Hotland, they were too invested in getting a nice satisfying ending to put the game down even if they knew exactly what was going to happen. 

It seemed like fate or more specifically Benry was not intent on letting them have that.

They were getting their bearings for the Mettaton fight in their second go around, finding a steady rhythm to dodge and duck as Death by Glamour played probably a little too loudly considering what time it was drifting out of their speakers when the obnoxious trill of the Discord incoming call sound disrupted them. Their hand jerked away from the simple set of arrowpad controls, tanking them into an unsavory but bearable amount of damage. Suffice to say, they were already in a sour mood as they clicked the pervasive green icon to settle whatever could possibly be dire enough to call them even before Sunkist and Tommy had started their bustling early morning walk.  
\-------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------

Gordon was awake. Maybe he really was getting the answer to his prayers about getting to spend some quality time comforting his favorite theoretical physicist. (Granted, Gordon was the only theoretical physicist he knew personally, but he had a feeling that knowing others in the profession would not sway his opinion on the matter.) Except, unlike the little fantasy he had been entertaining of an exhausted Gordon that looked appreciative of their best friend Benry stepping in with the assist, this Gordon looked wide awake and seemed to be sporting that dumb pissbaby expression they wore throughout most of the trek with Benry back at Black Mesa. That was pretty sucks.

“Benry, do you have any idea what time it is?!!” Gordon’s voice came in on the other line in a similar tone to that pointless lecturing façade they used when Benry wasn’t following one of the ten thousand little rules Gordon seemed to have for normal behavior, distinct even with the music vaguely being picked up by the in-system mic.

Benry shook his head with an almost stupid grin on his face. He actually had no clue what time it is. He only had a vague clue that it was sometime before dusk based on the odd tint the sky had taken on outside of the bedroom window they had at their little shared space with the rest of the Science Team who seemed to tolerate him alright despite everything. Gordon didn’t seem to appreciate this answer based on the way they face palmed, the jagged scar from where their hand had been respawned glinted from the monitor.

Instead of being forward with Gordon, he decided to do what he did best and make matters slightly worse, “dude, you’re the one getting’ down and voguing without your best bro benry. not my fault…my…my spidey sense was tingling that you were holdin’ out on me.”

He noted the realization pass across Gordon’s face and that familiar flare of red against his olive complexion. That’s the good stuff. They squinted into the screen, briefly glancing away from the corner of the monitor Benry occupied to minimize the mysterious window where the admittedly catchy tune had emanated from. He had to admit to that they looked pretty cute with their tongue slightly blepped in concentration and their bulky hipster glasses pushed to the edge of their nose to scrutinize the screen. That wasn’t saying much though seeing as Gordon always looked cute.

“I was trying to just distract myself enough to go to bed. Unlike some of us, I have important things to do with my time, and I would like to sleep at some point tonight,” Gordon offered back, headstrong to try to push through Benry’s mannerisms as they often did when they were a bit too exhausted to play along.

“yeah, putting out that fresh fortnite funnies for their audience. simp king gordon needs to go collect some kid’s college fund for being a cute lil’ gamer”  
\-------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------

Gordon rubbed their eyes on the other end of the screen, from exhaustion of exasperation it would be hard to tell. They couldn’t really tell. Those little strips of silvery grays eating at their temples particularly stood out in the harsh light of a computer monitor in a dark room. Jeez, when had that happened? When had they gotten so worn down and worse for wear?

At least Benry didn’t seem to mind. It wasn’t like they were trying to impress him or anything, but it was nice to note that the fresh coat of scars and the premature grays and their general broad and sturdy build they vaguely remembered one of the on sight marines referring to as “being built like a brick shithouse” wasn’t perturbing. If they weren’t sleep deprived and sitting on a simmering wealth of frustration from being unable to complete a task, they might have read into Benry’s babbling as a compliment or some well-intentioned misfire at flirting. 

Alright, maybe they did seek the approval of Benry just a little, but it’s not as if they really had anyone pursue them like Benry did. Sure, there was Joshy’s parent, but they didn’t really think that was comparable. They were in a very different place at the time and to even compartmentalize that as someone admiring Gordon would seem wrong. It felt nice to be wanted. It felt nice to have the power to take in Benry’s little asks for bits of contact as they wished even if they weren’t really sure anything would ever come of it.  
“Benry, you realize you’re the one who stole Tommy’s credit card to donate to super chat a few weeks ago. Are you really the one to be criticizing my career choices?” Gordon offered after a moment to refocus, deciding to play along with Benry’s tangent just enough so maybe they could get off this call before Joshua phoned in for his typical before-school check in.

“borrowed,” he corrected quite firmly.

“Fine, ‘borrowed’. The point is I am least doing something useful, supporting my son. Remember, the one you said looked a bit…”

“i didn’t meant that, gordon. was just joking. Was just a prank. didn’t know what to say about you having a little mini gordon. ‘s weird. you’re such a clumsy little boy. weird that you’re all married and doing job and taxes.”

It was weird almost to hear Benry actually use their name but not in a bad way. He had a certain pleasant drawl to the way he spoke, especially when he said their name.

“Divorced. I was married, but it didn’t really pan out,” Gordon amended, not really sure why they felt the need to make that clear.

“gordon cringeman had to get a cringe divorce from their fail spouse”

They nodded at that, a bit too tired to really reason with the Benryisms being thrown at them from the other end of the screen.

“must be pretty sucks to be a single parent, all alone,” Benry pressed on in a way that seemed all too much like some sort of messy way to flirt with the information they had just provided.

“I guess,” Gordon said with a yawn as the weight of being up for almost 24 hours straight began to eat at them, “But I still get to visit with Joshua, maybe more once some of the smoke clears about my brief disappearing act at Mesa and I get a more stable place.”  
With that mention, they gestured back to the efficiency apartment behind them, a cramped backdrop of boxes and bins suggesting they had barely unpacked from some past move and had added some gaming equipment to their hoard, some sort of escape hatch from this tiny place they had gotten back when they were barely home long enough to do much more than sleep, shower, and pop an energy drink out of the barren fridge. Maybe they should have been embarrassed about it, but it probably would be more embarrassing to be for an in to the shared Science Team complex at this point, even if seeing Benry more regularly would be…..nice.  
\-------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------

Benry didn’t often take note of the little nests humans made for themselves. They were often lined with the same bizarre set of rules Gordon often cited, but each one seemed to have its own variation that made his head spin. How was he expected to remember that some people insisted you sit on their beds while others expressly forbid it or how certain clothes or food just had to be stored? He had chosen to try to avoid these customs as much as possible, but actually having Gordon point out their living space, something wasn’t right. It vaguely reminded him of the rats that some scientist kept in a research wing adjacent to Tommy’s. They were kept in these clear plastic boxes barely any bigger than an eight pack of soda. It was cramped and lacking anything interesting to do, and the rats often started to either pace and claw incessantly with a certain frenzied nature to their movements or lose motivation entirely and spend their time slumped in dejected puddles of matted fur until they became dehydrated and malnourished and shriveled up like grotesque raisins. It wasn’t particularly pretty, and the thought that was how Gordon might be living made whatever garbled security impulse within his coding stir.

“dude, you’re living arrangement looks a bit shit”

Gordon blinked slowly at that, not in an affectionate feline manner as Benry had hoped they had picked up but as if the gears in their brain were muddled by cobwebs.

“I can take care of myself, Benry. It’s just temporary,” their tone sounded defensive, as if him pointing out a simple fact was hitting a nerve.

“seriously, bro. that’s not like a cool gamer nest with gamer snacks. it’s just kind of cringe. can’t have a fellow gamer living in the trenches”

Gordon yawned. Benry really couldn’t help but watch. They had pretty lame flat human teeth, but he supposed they had their charm. It was really only when they were tired like this Benry could get a better look at the strange little human things about them without getting swatted at or have his view hidden by Gordon getting all weirded out by his eyes trained on them. Couldn’t a bro just admire the view?

“I don’t know what THAT means,” they replied but with less of their usual force or frustration even if it was staged behind it. They really weren’t nearly as good as a springboard for Benry when they couldn’t even keep their eyes open long enough to look at the epic view they had.

“probably ‘cause you’re a little baby man, little clumsy sleep boy who can’t even stay up to talk to their best friend who’s trying to help them out”

There was quite on the other end of the line.

Was Gordon really going to be that cringe to just start ignoring him?

And then, he noticed something: Gordon was slumped over to their left against the headrest of their gaming chair.

They really had fallen asleep on call with Benry.

This was certainly uncharted social territory. On one hand, it was a good chance to admire Gordon without the fuss of being polite, but on the other hand, they guessed Gordon wouldn’t be happy to have him watching them sleep based on prior experience at Black Mesa. He instead settled for something even his lack of restraint about saying things that were often considered odd or out of place hadn’t allowed him to say.

“just worried about you, dude. get some rest…..love you, gordon,” Benry practically whispered into his mic just in case Gordon was just joshing him about falling asleep on call so he could have deniability.

Gordon stirred, a slight twitch and a little inhale. Benry was starting to understand what Gordon was always going on about with stress causing preemptive heart failure. If he had something analogous to a heart in his messy ported code, it would have stopped.

And then, they snored.

Benry couldn’t help but laugh a little. He really had gotten jump-scared by the little weak sauce physicist snoring. God and they really were snoring like a freight train, open mouthed and without a care in a world. Peaceful. They looked peaceful for once which was more than Benry had noted about most of their time at Black Mesa. They weren’t stressed or scared or on the brink of fainting, and in some way, Benry might have helped with that. It wasn’t something Benry knew he had wanted, but seeing Gordon with their glasses slightly askew where they slumped against their gamer chair and just the slight sliver of those brilliant green eyes from under their placidly closed eyelids, it quickly became something he was willing to chase, anything to see Gordon happy most likely starting with getting them out of that pitiful rat trap of an apartment.

He knew he should hang up. It was the “right” thing to do, and he was slowly starting to see the appeal of being good. Still, he couldn’t force himself to do it just yet. It was so hard to see them peacefully snoring what felt like inches away and not being able to reach out a hand to their warm skin. Maybe that’s why he leaned forward to press his hand against the warm monitor. A low trill of sweet voice bubbled up from somewhere deep and buried, a dull ruddy orange and a light sherbet shade of pink filling the dark room around him and parroting the sunrise taking place just outside his window. He hated to admit he knew exactly what it meant- rust to peach means you’re just out of reach. He never thought it would have a use outside of vent crawling or transport, but here he was swirled by the taunting orbs of color as the weight of being alone started to press on him.

He leaned closer in, hoping that if by simple will power alone he could convert back to pure binary data and slip through the screen for just a moment. It wouldn’t work, and the motion only served to finally push the neglected computer mouse to finally sever this pseudo-connection. It was a total noob mistake, but maybe it was for the better. At least the cocoon of sweet voice could keep him company.

**Author's Note:**

> I am so sorry to once again put Benry in such a bittersweet position, but it's just his fate now. Maybe he'll get fluff one day.
> 
> Thanks for reading!


End file.
